the united States has banned the electronic cigarettes of flavors, except the scent of tobacco and menthol, in the face of rising consumption among adolescents and the proliferation of a fatal lung disease linked to the use of these products, which has led to half a hundred deaths across the country.
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The new regulations, announced Thursday by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), gives a 30-day period to the companies to stop the distribution of cartridges with flavors. If they do not, and also if you do not take the “appropriate measures” to prevent the access of minors to their products, exposure to regulatory actions.
“the united States has never seen an epidemic of substance use to grow as fast as this current epidemic of the use of electronic cigarettes among young people,” he said in a statement, the secretary of Health and Human Services, Alex Azar.
The decision to continue allowing the sale of the cartridges of flavors of tobacco and menthol is due, he explained, the Chance, that they are “less attractive” to young people that the fruit or the flavors more sweet. The extension of pardon to the aroma minty, implies a rectification of the commitment made by the Administration in September to ban all flavors except tobacco. The exception is an important concession to the shops of electronic cigarettes that have proliferated in recent years, and will have a limited impact to Juul, a leading company in the sector, to which the intense scrutiny brought to stop the sale of cartridges of flavors in the country.
The president Trump already warned last Tuesday that the ban would enter into force “very soon”, and had words of support for the sector. “We believe that we will return to the market very, very fast. We have a very large industry,” he said in an appearance before journalists at his vacation residence of Mar-a-Lago, Florida, on the 31st day. “We’re going to protect our families, our children, and to the industry”, he added.
The industry had launched a powerful offensive from lobby to convince congress and the Administration that adult smokers need alternatives to stop cigarettes. The FDA has already tried, without success, to ban the sale of cartridges of flavors during the Obama Administration. But the argument of the ban has become more strong due to the growing popularity of these products among young people, experts fear that causes a rise in the addiction to the nicotine in the new generations, and mainly due to the increase of lung conditions, severe, related to the consumption of the steam of THC, psychoactive component of cannabis. Since mid-August, the condition has caused hundred of deaths and more than 2,500 hospital admissions.
despite the exceptions, the measure announced Thursday is the biggest step taken by the Government to curb consumption of electronic cigarettes among teens. One out of every four secondary school students admitted, in the most recent federal study, which had used these products in the last month, though its sale is prohibited to minors.
